Our founder
Debbie Rabishaw
Experienced HR leadership. Practical solutions. A genuine commitment to people and business.
With more than 35 years of HR leadership experience, Debbie has built and led HR functions for organizations ranging from growing businesses to complex, multi-state operations. Her background spans healthcare, professional services, privately held and family-owned businesses, and private equity-backed companies, including international HR leadership across the U.S. and India.
Throughout her career, Debbie has worked alongside business owners and leadership teams to navigate growth, organizational change, and challenging employee matters. She brings a practical perspective to HR, balancing the needs of the business with a genuine commitment to its people.
Debbie founded Next Step Advisory on the belief that growing businesses deserve access to experienced HR leadership without having to build a full internal department. Today, she leads a team that combines senior-level HR guidance with the operational support businesses need to manage their people, strengthen their practices, and plan for what’s next. She believes strong managers are essential to healthy workplaces and that practical, well-designed HR practices help both people and businesses succeed.
Connect with Debbie on LinkedIn → Listen to her podcast appearances →
Client stories
In their words.
A chief people officer, a physician, a law firm partner, and a founder, on what it is like to work with Debbie.
When I stepped into my role as chief people officer, I knew my strength was in strategic project work, change management, and building and evolving scalable people programs, but not in the day-to-day HR operations, benefits administration, compliance, and critical tactical work that keep the lights on. I needed someone who could come in right where I was, bring structure to the systematic chaos, and help me build confidence in the foundational HR functions our organization depended on. Debbie Rabishaw at Next Step Advisory was that person.
Debbie stepped in seamlessly with deep operational expertise, calm judgment, and an incredibly practical approach. She brought structure and clarity to the core HR functions while respecting and supporting the broader strategic direction we were building. Rather than operating in silos, Debbie worked as a true partner for me, translating complexity, anticipating risk, and creating stability that allowed me to focus where I add the most value.
What sets Debbie and Next Step Advisory apart is her ability to balance precision with perspective. She is thoughtful, unflappable, and deeply knowledgeable, and she brings a steady confidence that builds trust quickly with leaders, teams, and People executives alike. The result was a People function that felt both strategically ambitious and operationally sound. She was a perfect complement to me and served as a safe sounding board more times than I could count. If you’re a People leader looking for a partner who complements strategic leadership with best-in-class execution, I can’t recommend Next Step Advisory highly enough.
Our independent physicians’ office hired Debbie to help us with HR. We had grown over the years and as physicians with no background in HR, we didn’t know what we didn’t know. Debbie was exceptional in her attention to detail as she evaluated our practice for any areas of vulnerability, made sure we were in compliance with state policies, lent opinions on how we could streamline our processes and built out our systems for hiring and performance evaluation.
I had previously worked with a different HR company but it felt so impersonal, overwhelming and burdensome. I really wanted someone who would get to know our company, help get us up to speed and set us up for the future. Debbie was exactly that person and I anticipate that we will continue to use her consistently in the future even once the scope of her work has been completed.
Our small firm was growing and we needed help. Debbie helped us first get all of our employment policies and practices to be comprehensive and compliant. She then helped to automate many processes to reduce our burden and ensure compliance. Now she is helping us grow and maintain a productive workforce.
I can’t say enough good things about working with Debbie. Debbie helped us level up our employment practices while working with our values and goals. It is such a relief to have Debbie’s expertise on board. Her calm, warm demeanor also makes it enjoyable to work with her. Any employer would be lucky to have Debbie on their team.
Debbie has been an invaluable partner to True Health from the very beginning, helping us establish our HR foundation before we even opened our first location. As we’ve grown and prepared to open our second location, I honestly don’t know how we would have done it without her. From recruitment and hiring to compliance, employee policies, performance management, and implementing our entire HR system, Debbie has helped us build the processes and infrastructure we need to grow.
As a founder and CEO, what I value most is the confidence she gives me. I have complete trust that we’re considering the implications of our decisions, taking the appropriate steps, and protecting the business as we grow. I trust completely that she’s working with us and for us, with our best interests in mind. She genuinely feels like part of our team, and on top of everything else, she’s a lot of fun to work with.
If another founder or business owner asked me whether they should work with Debbie, my answer would be simple: Do yourself a favor and do it!
Let’s talk about your HR needs.
Thirty minutes to talk through what’s on your mind. Or take five minutes to see where your HR stands today.